Eileen's Wedding and CA fun!

Tyler and I spent July 5th-15th in my hometown, Elk Grove, California. My sister, Eileen, got married to Larry Thorpe in the Oakland Temple on the 12th. It was a lot of fun and really hot! I loved spending time with my family. I felt like I hadn't seen them in so long and my nieces and nephews were so old! I got to see my new nephew Parker, making him the 10th of my nieces and nephews. We saw 3 movies while we were there. Wall-e, Hancock, and Get Smart. I enjoyed Get Smart a lot and recommend it. I remember watching the tv show when I was younger so it was neat seeing the same kind of jokes on the big screen. We basically spent the rest our time swimming, eating out, celebrating bdays, and hanging with the fam. I have a bunch of pictures below of the fantastic trip.

2 years

I feel like I haven't blogged in so long, we've been out of town and since we got home our internet hasn't been working too great. Well a lot has happened in the last few weeks, so I guess I'll have a lot to blog about in the near future.

First off, Tyler and I had our anniversary on June 30. We went to Mongolian Grill (so yummy). We both chose to eat the buffet because of the neat way it's cooked. There's an all-can-eat buffet with lots of veggies, meat, pasta, fruit...things like that, and some yummy sauces to top it off. Then you give your full bowl to the cook and he'll grill it all right there in front of you. It's a great atmosphere and even though we both ate a ton, we felt pretty good afterwards because the food was so light. Then we headed over to the mall where traditionally we get the set of pictures taken in the booths. (It took us a couple pictures to get the hang of it. The very first picture caught us off guard and we took the second picture staring at ourselves instead of the camera...but I think we got it after that, haha.)

After that we went and saw Baby Mama in the theater. Too funny. There was more to the plot than I thought there would be. Oh and Tyler got me some gorgeous flowers and I woke up early and heart attacked the front room before he woke up. All in all, it was a good day.

"So this is the miracle that I've been dreaming of..."

So Tyler and I have been married for two years tomorrow! It’s crazy how time flys! It also feels like I’ve known him forever and that I’ve always been with him. He is the greatest husband! It's a dream being married to him. He's so thoughtful and smart. We've made lots of memories that will last forever and I know that each day will continue to get better.

We’re celebrating by going to Mongolian Grill and seeing a movie. Any suggestions for a movie? We still don’t know which one we’ll see. Well, I thought it would be fun to check out what else happened on June 30^th in history. If you’re a geek like me and like to know that stuff too then read on.

Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind, one of the best-selling novels of all time and the basis for a blockbuster 1939 movie, is published on this day in 1936.

The first Chevrolet Corvette, a white convertible roadster with a red interior, was produced in 1953.

Sandy Koufax strikes out 13 batters and walks five to lead the Brooklyn Dodgers to victory over the New York Mets 5-0 with his first career no-hitter.

The Erie Railroad rolled out its first passenger train in 1841

Charles Blondin crossed Niagara Falls on a tightrope in 1859.


The 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified when Ohio became the 38th state to approve it. The amendment lowered the minimum voting age to 18 in 1971.



U.S. President Clinton signed the E-Signature bill to give the same legal validity to an electronic signature as a signature in pen and ink in 2000.

Tyler and Emily Pearson got married for time and all eternity in the Oakland Temple in 2006.

It's all in the bag...

This is a girly post, but I was looking at makeup online and reading reviews on what's been rated Absolute Best by Instyle Magazine. And I got to thinking...sure this is probably great makeup, but $50+ for eye shadow?! Come on. I couldn't spend that much on makeup and ever feel good about it. But I like doing makeup and so I figured I'd share some of my favorite makeup products to those who won't spend a ton of money on products either.

I've gone through tons!!! of mascaras. I've tried literally dozens and keep going back to the same one. Tyler tells me I'm actually not allowed to buy any new mascaras until I've really thought about it and remembered my history with mascara. I'll see a great ad on tv, want that mascara, buy it, but because I'm so picky when it comes to mascara, I wont like the new one very much, I'll barely use it and end up going back to my favorite. I remember cleaning out my makeup bag one day and throwing away 12 mascaras (while still keeping some... sad I know) So pretty much every kind I've tried and I've got to say Maybelline's Full and Soft mascara is my favorite. It's what I keep going back to.

Another favorite is Mary-Kate and Ashley's Creme Eye Color. I've tried it in 3 different sets and I've loved all 3. It's basically what I use everyday. They're really inexpensive and go on so smooth. They're good for bases or for your main color and it's easy to blend. (Mine have never come with the bonus body jewels this one comes with... too bad... haha)


I've tried all sorts of eye liners too... from pencils to liquids. I've found that I really like Maybelline's Expert Eye Crayon. It goes on a whole lot smoother than pencils. I recommend any crayon over pencils, but I really like this one. Mostly because it's cheap and it lasts a long time. Not only on your eye lids, but also as an eyeliner. I've used eyeliners that I swear must disappear while I'm not looking because they just run out so quickly. I've found Maybelline carries the best for the buck generally.Oh, one other is Jane Eyeshadow. I love this stuff. The makeup I bought for my wedding is Jane brand (a couple eye shadows and a bronzer). I bought it because it was pretty cheap and they had the colors I was looking for. The brown eye shadow I've used everyday since I bought it for our wedding and you can't even tell there's been much use. (And there were many days when working at a restaurant that I'd come home midday, take a shower, and need to reapply makeup again.) I feel like it's never ending. Great stuff.There's a great website that sells E.L.F. makeup. E.L.F. stands for Eyes Lips Face and almost all their makeup is just a dollar. I haven't bought from them yet, but my sister-in-law has. She told me that although the makeup comes in smaller sizes, the makeup is actually pretty good quality, so you end up using less of it anyway.

Anyway... there's more I can mention, but I'll stick to these for now. I want to know what makeup other people have found they love. What are your staples?

Summer BBQ

We had a BBQ last Saturday with our neighbors out on the front lawn. It was Sarah and Jacob Pierce, Kendra and Joseph Seymour, Lissa and Severin Nelson, Anslin and Matt Ball, and Tyler and I. It was a lot of fun! Tyler cooked up hamburgers and hot dogs and everyone else brought a lot of tasty food. We stayed out late playing Catch Phrase until we couldn't read the words anymore. We all shouted a bunch of crazy answers (well mainly me...I swear I know that the Eiffel Tower isn't in New York and that the 3rd rock from the sun isn't Mars (at least I wasn't the alone on that one)) and had a blast. We'll definitely do it again soon. Here's some fun pictures of the night.

Joseph, Tyler, Kendra, Sarah, and Jacob

Joseph, Kendra, Sarah, Anslin, Matt, Tyler the grill master, Jacob, Lissa, and some of Severin

Joseph, Lissa, and Severin

Tyler, Jacob, Lissa, Sarah, Severin, Anslin, and Matt

Kendra and Joseph

Anslin, Matt, Sarah, Jacob

The timer stopped on Tyler

Take Two

We planted a garden! Well... this is our second try. For some reason almost all the plants died on our first try. We think we took pretty good care of them, so we don't know what happened. Maybe this crazy weather lately? Hopefully this time around things go a lot better. So far so good. Here's some pictures of our garden.

Strawberries...I'm so excited!

You can see a tiny little strawberry growing!

Our two tomato plants

Four habanero pepper plants and four red bell pepper plants

potatoes!

You can't see them, but under the potatoes we have green beans and carrots growing

And our cute little watermelon

The view of our whole garden

House Warming Party

We invited a bunch of friends over for a house warming party on the 24th of May. It was a lot of fun. We ate ice cream and it was neat to see everyone. I was hoping to decorate our apartment before when we showcased it, but that didn't happen. I know some of you have been wanting to see pictures of our apartment, but I haven't taken any yet because we still haven't decorated and I wanted to wait until we had. But here's a sneak peak of our down stairs and I'll show more pictures later.